The brothers, The Beans
Gabriel Marcelo and Paulo Leon are building on the music scene in Hamilton through their music, their venue, and their record label.
Chilean-Canadian brothers Gabriel Marcelo and Paulo Leon are building on Hamilton’s music scene on multiple fronts. They are lifelong Hamiltonians, and frontmen of three-piece rock band The Beans and duo dance project CIN5O (pronounced seeng-koh).
Marcelo is a McMaster graduate, and Leon is currently enrolled at Mohawk College, due to graduate later this year. The brothers are the organizers behind countless arts events across the downtown core, are co-owners of the venue Andthenyou and the creative minds behind the record label andthenyoudie. The brothers have played across the city under both bands, including performing at the Art Gallery of Hamilton for 905 Fest’s A Night of Community kick-off event.
“These are just our roots,” said Leon. “We love Hamilton. We’ve never had a second doubt about building [the community] here rather than in other GTA areas.”
The Beans is an English and Spanish-language indie-rock three-piece. Marcelo handles the bass, Leon plays the drums, Sam Keravica is the guitarist, and the brothers both contribute vocals. The band name started as a joke, emerging as a one-off riff while the brothers practised in their basement.
"Then, when we finally got our first gig, collectively we were wondering, ‘Shit, what are we gonna call ourselves?’ So we decided, fuck it, we are The Beans, and so we became The Beans,” said Marcelo.
The duo’s parents are Chilean immigrants who fled the country after the coup d’etat that installed the dictator Pinochet in 1973. Arts lovers themselves, the couple would bring their sons to a variety of music festivals in different genres, from N.W.A and Dr. Dre, to acoustic-based Chilean folk music.
As teens, the brothers were heavily involved in the Hamiltonian slam poetry scene, specifically through the Hamilton You Poets.
“Nea Reid really mentored us in those formative years, from like 2014-2017,” said Marcelo. “They also had some beat-making workshops that Paulo attended as well, early on in his youth, that led him to dropping his first mixtape. That was the first official project that we did under andthenyoudie, which at the time was just a collective, but then it blossomed beautifully into what it is now, which is an independent record label.”
Since that 2018 mixtape and first show, the brothers are rarely seen working on projects independent of one another, and that’s how they prefer it.
“A lot of the things that I’ve made in the past and currently, it’s me being alone in the studio, and then bringing it to Gabe,” said Leon. “Which makes the process kind of like a co-producer/executive producer role. To this day, I haven’t released anything that hasn’t passed through his ears first.
“Logistically, it’s me at the helm, and Gabe incorporating ideas, and we go back and forth recording and looping stuff. We do also swap engineer roles if I’m recording vocals. For example, ‘SOS,’ The Beans’ song, was originally a Paulo Leon song. Then I brought it to The Beans, and it turned out to be a really great live track that really resonated with people.”
Keravica, the guitarist and third member of The Beans, is a photographer, a background the brothers say provides an alternative perspective to the project. “It’s definitely a trio, he’s very much involved in the process,” said Leon.
Before it became Andthenyou in 2022, the 145 Main St. E. venue was Sous Bas. The former club hosted a collaborative co-programming space called Clubhouse, where the brothers first built their event-organizing muscles.
“When they announced it was closing, we wanted to keep the light going. Basically, keep the fire alive and not have it go to a, y’know, like an outside Toronto, or like Miami investment,” said Marcelo. “We wanted it to stay true to its roots. Huge shoutout to Erika McMeekin, the old owner. She’s still a huge mentor and took us under her wing to help train us and get us to where we are.”
The brothers live in the east end, making the back-and-forth of venue management and overseeing 13 staff an easier task.
“What made Sous Bas such a great venue was that it made people feel welcome and heard, and that it was safe and inclusive within the night scene,” said Leon. “We had a cool opportunity where we were like, ‘Hey, we’re living the scene, we’d like to help support it by being an organizer.’”
Marcelo says the management journey hasn’t always been smooth sailing.
“We had a learning curve doing it, it’s not easy, but I think we are confident in our ability to manage that, and we have,” said Marcelo. “That goes for the rest of our team, who we love so deeply, and the people. It's such a joy.”
Why invest in a Hamilton venue? “Because we’re Hamilton, born and raised in Steel City, y’know?” said Leon. “We want to, through our talents and organization, put the city on the map and let it be known.”
And the two are fans of Hamilton’s edge. As Marcelo describes it: “I would say it’s in-your-face, but warm.” With their years of experience booking gigs with outside musicians, the brothers say they’ve noticed that GTA artists are missing the community integral to Hamilton’s core.
“We’re beautifully gritty, and we own it, and we support each other as need be,” said Leon.
But arts funding needs to change.
“The big gap is from the current municipal and provincial budgets that are available. There’s not a lot of current outreach or networking to be on the ground to give that funding where it’s needed … The current gentrification that’s going on with the condos and stuff, it’s important to keep that grassroots level arts scene/community collectives.”
And people need to attend shows, says Marcelo. “Everybody’s amped up when Joe Jonas books the TD [Coliseum], but they’re not as amped up when a local, hardworking band has a show. There’s a public level of awareness that I think also needs some work.”
The brothers' long-term goal is to provide the local scene with a hangout space for as long as they can.
“When all is said and done, when we’re kicking it in the grave, I think the big-picture plan is, ‘Hey, this venue was alive.’ There’s a little Wikipedia summary about the andthenyou scene, and it shows all of these now acclaimed artists that resulted from being a part of this era,” said Leon. “I think that’s the end goal. Then, ideally, the next generation continues it.”
After our interview, Marcelo and Leon sent us this joint statement:
“The ability to support the scene directly in a city we were born to love, to do so independently, and to build a community and family we love is priceless. We do it all for the kids in us, who grew up in the same city, with the biggest dreams. To any other kid out there, you can, no matter what the other voices say. Just believe and stay grounded, and don't lose the kid within. They're right, usually.”
